Tuesday, February 3, 2009

OU Celebrates (Gasp!) the Ideas of Charles Darwin

That's right Sooner fans, in honor of the 150th anniversary of (brace yourself!) Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, OU is celebrating the world's most famous naturalist and the father of (again: brace yourself)the theory of evolution.

This is no small celebration either. OU is hosting several months of lectures and events on Darwin and his ideas, including events that involve (Heaven help us!) OU students, young minds that will be forever warped by exposure to Satanic and alien ideas.

Imagine that: University students (right here in the Heartland) exposed to Darwin and evolution. Next thing you know, they will be reading Marx, drinking wine and thinking impure thoughts!

Those evil OU administrators and professors (and—who knows?— even coaches!) will even be hosting the infamous nonbeliever Richard Dawkins for a lecture.

He's an actual atheist, and no atheist should ever speak in Oklahoma, much less at OU. That might cause all of us believers to question our faith in God, Republican politics, and—Heaven forbid!—Sooner football. And, let's face it, fellow Okies: We can't have any of that.

22 comments:

I have been working a post on my blog in honor of Darwin's 200th birthday this month and the 150the anniversary of the publication of "The Origin of the Species."

Many of my friends are very nice people but are also creationists and I hope they don't disown me. I just don't think there is any conflict between Christianity and the theories of Charles Darwin, as they have survived and been modified today.

Once again, the blogger ERV is worth reading. She is a grad student at OU, studying HIV. She and her fellow students put "Intelligent Design" guru William Dembski on the hot seat when he appeared on campus.

Occasionally, you drop all pretenses and just let your utter disdain of those amongst whom you live show forth in all its unfettered glory. Today was such a day; you drip such venom that it is clear you certainly do not like Oklahomans in general.

That's your right. I would only suggest that you not be surprised when those whom you rather obviously despise so much read your future comments with that in mind--that is, no church-going Oklahoman is going to credit you with even a shred of objectivity, or even civility.

I'm as much an Oklahoman as anyone in the state. I figure all these church-goers should be able to take the presentation of ideas about which there is an overwhelming consensus among scientists today. If they don't like it, boo hoo.

Well, if one's faith is threatened by evolution, then it's not much of a faith. Personally, my Christian faith is not threatened in the least by the fact of evolution. And it's been my experience that very few conservatives are even interested in trying to understand divergent viewpoints, so I don't think many of them are even reading this.

Of course, I neither said nor hinted a thing about anyone's faith being threatened, or their reactions to such a threat. In responding to an argument that no one made, it seems to me that you have demonstrated superficial reading.

Other than that, the collective response to the observation I did make--that the post reflects complete contempt for a very sizeable number of people in the state in which you live and that it is therefore reasonable not to expect those people to take you seriously when you expect to be treated as objective, civil writers--is apparently a small variation on, "...and the horses they rode in on!"

OK, Dan of the West, I don't care whether your redneck hicks are from OK, TX, LA, KS or parts unknown, live and let live, but I don't want them running the country or teaching science. Looks like more Americans are agreeing with me.

We may have another customer for one of Man of the West's T-shirts, Edwin Vineyard at the Oklahoma Observer (whom AT mentioned in another item.)

Vineyard said in his article:

"The best and the brightest of our leadership aspirants (in OK) tend to be rejected at the polls, and too often it seems that voters elect screwballs and dimwits to represent us. It was not always so, but that has been the trend."

We have had good and effective politicians from Oklahoma, but the trend has been downward. And our Senators have really covered us in...glory.

Let's see, I'm a person of faith, a logical thinker, and a perceptive reader, but perhaps I did not explain my point in such a way as Man would have me do so. I am an Oklahoman, born and eleven generations-bred, yet I embrace intellectualism and scientific knowledge, therefore I was not offended by any "utter disdain." I find that the reason some Oklahomans, and people in general, oppose the teaching of evolutionary fact is out of fear that they will be forced to call their own faiths into question.

Everybody's got a sacred cow, and nobody likes getting theirs ridiculed. When conservatives poke sacred cows, they are being "funny," it is a joke, they don't like being PC, we don't know how to take a joke. But when liberals poke fun at conservatives expense, or simply reveal the man behind the curtain, we are being mean, unfair, we drip venom, we are trying to deny 1st Amendment rights, we don't like you. And folks who don't respect us anyway, they won't, what, respect us more?

Like I said before, people who aren't inclined to consider divergent viewpoints worthy of respect or even listening, aren't here and aren't reading this. Should AT be tailoring the message to pamper the delicate sensibilities of people who think Rush Limbaugh is the voice of reason? AT's message belongs to AT, and he/she/they are under no obligation to phrase it in any other way than the way they choose to do so, venom-drippy or not.

I pointed out that this post is one of those wherein AT makes his/their contempt for a sizable chunk (if not the majority) of the Oklahomans amongst whom they live abundantly clear. I don't think I am being at all unfair in saying that the post characterizes them as undereducated, none-too-intelligent, religious bigots. I also think that said attitude makes it difficult to take AT's opinions on the subject as being at all objective.

The response to my observation seems to have run along these line:

1. But they are undereducated, none-too-intelligent, religious bigots.

2. If they don't like what's said about 'em here, they should smarten up and develop a thicker skin.

3. Conservatives don't read this blog anyway, so eff 'em.

4. AT was only joking anyway (what about #1 and #3?)

5. It's okay that we (since you seem to agree with the attitude with which I have credited AT) despise a lot of the people around here/make mean jokes about them (depending on which stage of the thought process you're in, I guess) because Rush and Sean are mean to liberals.

Well, okay. If that's what you think, that's what you think. FWIW, there are at least two conservatives that read this blog on a regular basis, me being one of them, and for all you know, maybe more than that. And all I'm sayin' is that you've made it clear what you think of us and that we can't be blamed for taking it into account when evaluating opinions aired here.

It seems to me that you are trying to persuade this blog to soften its language for the sake of possibly winning the approbation of folks whose approbation really isn't up for grabs.

If it has as negative effect as you say, why not applaud AT's tone in hopes that he and his compadres will further alienate all these church-going Oklahomans?

A conservative who previously wrote on this blog warned similarly about making sport of Brent Rinehart. Rinehart was an OKC political candidate who put out a crudely drawn and written comic book which assigned blame to "liberal good ol’ boys," gays and Satan for his losing campaign.

Despite the ridicule Rinehart received here and around the country, he lost his election by a staggering margin, and now faces multiple felony counts alleging improper campaign behavior.

It's genuinely remarkable how many times I can say the same thing, fairly plainly, and have all sorts of other motives ascribed to what I've written.

I'm not trying to modify AT's behavior at all. Where on earth you got that idea, I don't know. It certainly wasn't in any of my comments. To wit, I started off with, vis-a-vis the rather obvious contempt on AT's part:

That's your right. I would only suggest that you not be surprised when those whom you rather obviously despise so much read your future comments with that in mind...

Then in a subsequent comment:

...the post reflects complete contempt for a very sizeable number of people in the state in which you live and that it is therefore reasonable not to expect those people to take you seriously when you expect to be treated as objective, civil writers...

Then in another:

...all I'm sayin' is that you've made it clear what you think of us and that we can't be blamed for taking it into account when evaluating opinions aired here.

From such stuff, you've decided that I'm trying a little "behavior mod" on AT!

It seems to me that you are trying to persuade this blog to soften its language for the sake of possibly winning the approbation of folks whose approbation really isn't up for grabs.

Well, I'll take one last stab at making the point clear: the point is not "AT should soften its tone to gain approval from conservatives." It's too late for that. The point is: "Posts like this have made it clear that anything coming from this source is not the work of someone thoughtfully exploring ideas, but rather from ideologues contemptuously dismissive of other people's viewpoints, and therefore cannot be taken seriously, no matter how reasonably written in the future."

It's a point of information, not an attempt at behavior mod. By all means, rave on...

And once again Man of the Testy proves that conservatives are masters of projection. The main problem with liberals is that we are TOO accommodating, we are TOO invested in compromise, we are too interested in what others think of us. The conservatives have never had these problems and we should take a page from their playbook. Yes, oh Man, AT is very thoughtfully exploring ideas, just not the ideas of which you approve.